Pele
Edson Orantes do Nascimento, known as Pele, the king of soccer, thanked his fans for their affection and good wishes on his 70th birthday on Saturday, and particularly the gift of T-shirt autographed by players of the team Santos.
Pele, who preferred to celebrate his birthday with his family and away from the cameras, used the Twitter account of his son, former goalkeeper Edinho, to publish a photo of his 70th birthday party, and to thank the players of Santos, the team where he began his professional career at the age of 17.
The King was born in the city of Tres Corazoes in the state of Minas Gerais, and began to play as a professional when he was 17 years old in the Santos club, in Sao Paulo state.
For this team, for which he is the main idol in 98 years of history, Pele scored a good part of his 1,284 career goals, including No. 1,000; won 11 championships, and was top scorer 11 times.
The King still holds the record as top Brazilian scorer, with 95 goals in 114 games.
mh/rab/iff/ale
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Legend of the game reaches latest milestone
1. Pele scored a total of 1,283 first-class goals, including 77 for Brazil.
2. He won three World Cups, two World Club Championships and nine Sao Paulo State Championships.
3. Pele was named after American inventor Thomas Edison, his real name being Edson Arantes do Nascimiento.
4. Pele was signed by Santos when he was 15. He scored four goals on his league debut in a match against FC Corinthians on September 7, 1956.
5. Waldemar de Brito, another great Brazilian forward, is credited with discovering Pele, taking him to Santos, and telling them then that he was going to be “the greatest football player in the world.”
6. At 17, Pele became the youngest ever winner of a World Cup. He also scored twice in the final against home side Sweden.
7. Pele was appointed as Minister of Sport in Brazil in 1995, serving until 1998.
8. He was voted athlete of the century by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) in 1999.
9. In 1997, Pele was given an honorary British Knighthood.
10. On November 19, 1969, Pele scored his 1000th career goal. Hundreds raced onto the pitch to mob the Brazilian star and it took over thirty minutes for the game to resume. (more…)
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Image of Messier 101, or the Pinwheel Galaxy, showing 'straight' arms, slightly squarish in appearance. A team of astronomers theorize that our galaxy may resemble M101. Image: NASA/ESA.
Brazilian astronomers have proposed a new model to explain the structure of our galaxy, the Milky Way. The new model suggests that our galaxy may have one more arm than previously thought and that these arms are more straight than curved.
The astronomers, led by Jacques Lepine at the University of Sao Paulo, used data from clouds of gas to develop their new proposed model.
In order to study the structure of the Milky Way, the astronomers studied spectra created by Carbon monosulphide clouds, contrary to the common method of analyzing spectra from clouds of ionized hydrogen. This method was used in hopes of producing an accurate ‘face-on’ map of our galaxy.
The postulated extra arm, if indeed actual, will increase the number of known arms from two to three. Previously, in 2008, the number was changed from four to two. This new arm is estimated to be about 30,000 light-years from the center of the Milky Way and is thought to have a “strong inward curvature”.
The new model also suggests that our Solar System is in one of the straightest parts of an outer arm of our galaxy.
According to Lepine and his team of researchers: “Drawing a map of the Milky Way is a challenging task, since we only have an edge-on view of the galaxy in which we reside. … We may not ever know exactly what our galaxy would look like when viewed from other worlds, but we’ll keep trying.”
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It’s 3 am in Brazil and birds are singing outside my bedroom window. As I recall, in the US don’t most birds sleep at night like the rest of us? However, I adore these nighttime songbirds as a symbol of the unique pleasure of Brazil.
I’m so content living in Brazil that sometimes I start singing, too. I can do this when I’m sober, by the way, and my Brazilian wife takes no notice of my behavior. Other times, my expatriate exuberance manifests itself in sleeplessness. During the night I’ll awaken to the songbirds, stirred from my dreamy slumber with thoughts of the upcoming day. I don’t want to sleep for fear of missing anything.
Could it be that, like me, the birds can’t control their exuberance and are forced to sing instead of sleep? Are they are so filled with wonderment at the joy of living in Brazil that they need to express themselves continually?
It seems everyone in Brazil is having too much fun to sleep. Brazilians are singing all the time. Like other Latin American cultures, Brazil personifies the living customs of an ancient oral tradition. Simply stated for my tired brain: Brazilians love to communicate — in words, songs, or gestures.
Brazilians will strike up conversations anywhere at any time with anyone: clerks, strangers, cashiers. In fact, it’s considered rude for a Brazilian to enter a room without speaking. For example, the waiting room in a doctor’s office or an occupied elevator requires at least a hello to the strangers. In the US, it’s considered impolite to speak to anyone you don’t know.
Learning to wait on long lines is an acknowledged rite of passage in Brazil. I’m not saying there aren’t lines in the US. Even there, teenagers will spend seven hours waiting for AC/DC concert tickets. However, while standing on line at the post office in the US, it’s not common to begin a conversation with a stranger. Brazilians who visit the US return home and describe to their astonished friends how they’d seen Americans on lines reading, rather than talking to those nearby. When I mentioned this custom of silence to a Brazilian woman, she replied, “Why wouldn’t you talk to people in line? It helps to pass the time.” What an excellent technique for adapting to adversity, I realized — talk your way through it.
Talking is so ingrained in Brazilian culture that it’s not considered rude to repeat yourself. Even talking (or singing) to oneself is acceptable. And not only do Brazilians love to talk, they enjoy listening. Thus the popularity of telenovelas. Visit any store or office in Brazil, and you will hear the employees talking about last night’s episode of the soap opera. (more…)
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The world will travel to Brazil for the next World Cup while in the meantime the South American powerhouse will tour the globe in their bid to become World Cup winners for the sixth time in 2014.
New coach Mano Menezes and his team looked very much at home in the English midlands on Monday when they beat a gritty Ukraine side 2-0 at Derby County’s Pride Park, the latest venue to host the team who remain football’s biggest attraction.
At face value Brazil playing Ukraine in a provinical English city on a Monday in October can be seen as just another money-spinner in an already over-crowded international calendar.
But neither Derby County nor Menezes sees it quite like that and television channels also reflected huge interest with the match televised live to more than 100 countries around the world.
John Vicars, Derby’s vice-president of operations, told Reuters before the match the game clearly was one of the most prestigious Derby had ever hosted.
“We had only had two weeks to organise it after plans to stage it in the Middle East failed to materialise.
“We had a phone call from the agency that organises Brazil’s friendlies outside Brazil to see if we could host it instead as we are one of a number of clubs they deal with.
“You don’t say ‘no’ to Brazil, do you, and of course it was a tremendous honour for us to do so. As long as we break even which I am sure we will, we will be happy“. (more…)
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